Dark Angel
by RomanceGuru
Summary: RayneJayne&RiverHalloween.For the LJ Cobb&Tam challange.“She’s so cute when she’s being all psychotic and playful.” R&R :


Title: Dark Angel  
Author: romanceguru  
Rating: R for an inkling of morbidity and sexual references.  
Challenge: Rayne-y Halloween

Summary: Post BDM. Everyone's alive and well, except of course, the ghosts…

Notes: River does her creepy thing in lieu of the holiday. In actually, it would be quite fitting for Jayne and River to be brought together on this night, of all nights.

Would never be quite right without a good beta-_ing_ from elsibet34. Thank you always!

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"What in the sphincter hell is going on here? Anyone care to tell me why my ship looks like it's about to go up in flames?" Mal's stern voice boomed through the sparsely lit cargo bay.

"Ask ta freak." Jayne muttered as he came down into the hold, cautiously looking around for the sound of River-patter. "Girl's been hauntin' ta place like a gorram nut job all day."

"You mean the candles, cap'n?" Kaylee asked cheerily, ignoring Jayne. "Ain't they shiny? River thought they'd complete the mood. You know, for the ritual sacrifice an' all."

Mal sputter-coughed as the few lights still on flickered and then went out completely. The only light source now piercing the darkness was the yellow-orange glow of the candles. The catwalk above squeaked slightly as a thin figure dressed in wisps of white flowing garb ghosted past.

"Lil' witch is that you?" Mal called up to the source, his eyes still adjusting to the low lighting. Truth be told, he was starting to get a little spooked. "You best come down at present and explain to me what's about. I don't allow sacrifices of any kind on my boat."

In an instant River appeared in front of Mal, her white painted face contrasting freakishly with her large brown eyes, causing him to jump back and yelp. "We're going to sacrifice Jayne." River explained coolly. "It's the most logical choice. He will be least missed." There was a lopsided smirk on her lips as she winked conspiratorially at the captain.

Jayne had been walking the perimeter of the candles, shaking his head in disapproval when he perked up at hearing his name and the word sacrifice mentioned in the same sentence. "Come again?"

Mal continued to stare at her blankly. River sighed, and jerked her head towards Jayne, arching her eyebrows, trying desperately to communicate through the exaggerated expression of her eyes.

"Oh. _Right_." Mal over-annunciated his words as he began to catch on. "Conjure we can spare the big guy. Just promise me you'll help find a replacement." It was hard for Mal to resist the opportunity to torture, well, anyone.

Jayne began to back away as River turned slowly, and stared at him blankly. "Come. It's time." Her voice sent a deep, unpleasant chill straight to his bones.

"Nuh uh. You ain't as so gettin' near me, lil' crazy." Jayne protested, taking in her unworldly appearance. Her dress almost looked like some kind of cotton bridal gown, fitting snugly on top, down to her tiny waist and from there the thin translucent layers of material billowed out around her small frame. Her face was just as pale, her eyes lined heavily in black, and her lips stained deep crimson. She looked like something out of one of them scary flix he'd seen off the cortex and it was making the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.

Just then, Zoë, Wash, Simon, Book and Inara appeared on the catwalks above. "What's goin' on? The lights went out. Everyone…" Zoë's voice trailed off as she spied over a hundred candles lining the walkways, stairs and cargo-bay floor.

"Is that a pentagram?" Book muttered aghast under his breath as he spied a large circle of candles covering the ground floor with a painted star making up the center.

"Oh, my." Inara exclaimed, while Simon's mouth just fell open.

"Wow. I take it you weren't going for a romantic vibe with the freaky candle thing." Wash commented. "What's the occasion?"

"Apparently, lil' witch here is preparing to sacrifice Jayne." Mal turned and whispered to River who was steadily inching her way towards the wide-eyed merc, who continued to back away from her step for step. "Why is it we're doing this again?"

"Old pagan ritual. Brings luck and good fortune for the coming year. Works more effectively with a virgin, but none reside here."

Simon choked at that, and his face went pale as he gripped the railing in front of him. He looked like he was going to faint.

"Oh! Can I play? Nothing like a good satanic rite to liven the evening." Wash called down excitedly.

"Can't be squeamish." River answered back. "There will be lots of blood."

Inara turned to Simon, placing her graceful hand on his arm, and asked with grave concern, "Is River still on her meds?"

Simon didn't seem to hear her as he was entangled deep in his own thoughts. The situation seemed vaguely familiar and he was trying to pin point why.

Jayne looked back and forth uneasily between River and the rest of the crew. "Hardy har. I git it. This all some kind of joke yer all in on." Jayne let out a nervous laugh, but only because the girl was peering eerily from beneath a dark curtain of hair and it was making his stomach uneasy.

"No trick for the treat." River smiled and cocked her head. " Pain will be minimal."

"Mal? Doc? This ain't cute no more. Someone gonna come wrestle up crazy an' lock her in her room or do I have ta?"

The memory finally clicked in Simon's brain. His sister had done something similar to him one Halloween when they were kids. Only, during that incident she had tried to convince him that their parents were possessed by demons. She had gathered up many foul ingredients for an elaborate witches' brew. It was the only way to send the evil spirits back to the underworld, she had argued, all wide-eyed and adorably convincing.

Simon smiled. His sister really was showing progress; she was falling back into her old mischievous habits and she had even acquired a new victim to practice them on. He fought the smirk threatening the corners of his mouth and called down as seriously as he could, "Just make it quick _mei mei_. Thought perhaps we might carve up some pumpkins after."

Kaylee smiled up at the doc, he was catching on. Wash knew the game from the first minute; he and River were more alike than most would think. Zoë still looked uncertain. Inara and Book's expressions were about as petrified as Jayne's.

River pointed one slender finger towards Jayne. "You. Lay in the center of fire. I will prepare the bindings."

"No ruttin' way! Yer off yer gourd…" Jayne looked to Mal and Kaylee who were just standing there smiling oddly. "An' it seems ta be catchin'." Deep down, he knew they were just messing with him, but he weren't gonna stick around to see how far they were going to let crazy take things. He turned on his heels and stomped heavily up the stairs. When he looked back over his shoulder, he saw that the _feng le _girl had started to pursue, so he picked up his pace.

River bounded up the stairs shouting after him. "You can hide. But the voices will tell me where you are!"

"She's so cute when she's being all psychotic and playful." Wash mused as he watched the two disappear deep into the ship.

Book cleared his throat as he started follow. "Maybe someone should stop River from…"

"Relax, Shepard. Riv's just puttin' one over Jayne." Kaylee reassured the holy man. He stopped and looked at her for further explanation. "She's payin' him back for embarrassin' her in front of that boy she was interested in on Beaumonde the week past."

"Ah, I remember that incident." Wash recalled. "Didn't he toss a straight jacket at her and tell her to hurry up and take her meds before she started offing people again? Right in front of the kid too, looked like he was about to ask her out. Never seen someone hightailed out of a place so fast. Thought we were the masters in _that_ arena."

Inara let out a long sigh of relief. "Thank god. I thought for a moment you were all suffering from space dementia."

Zoe laughed. "I considered narcotics a possibility."

"Nope. Just old fashioned payback." Kaylee chirped.

"Well, while lil' witch's off turnin' my big bad merc into a petrified mass, why don't we put out the fire?"

"Aww, come on cap'n. Can't we leave 'em up for the scary stories?" Kaylee slung her arms around Mal and batted her lashes extra prettily.

"Fine." Mal relented. "But somthin' catches fire, I'm holdin' ya accountable."

---

River was on the hunt. Serenity was pitch black and blanketed in a dead quiet as she stalked through the empty corridors in search of the Jayne-beast. She was familiar with the ship this way. Learned and explored every room, walkway, nook and cranny while avoiding the nightmares that awaited her slumber in the still quiet of midnight. Nothing could be more frightening than horrid dreams of the past, not even the eerie darkness encompassing the ship.

She could smell him stronger with each step, his scent was thick and musky, like a wild animal. The untamed aroma was laced with aftershave and cigar smoke, and she found her self captiously drawn to it.

Entering the mess with feather light steps, the scent overpowered, and tackled her from behind. Jayne quickly snaked his arms under hers and locked his hands firmly behind her head. "Ah ha!" He sung triumphantly in her ear. "Thought you was all sneaky, psycho-girl. But ya can't out track a tracker."

River struggled against him but he held on tighter. "Done messin' with my head, lil' girl?" he growled in her ear.

She bucked defiantly against him, trying to ignore the deep chill his voice had sent down her spine. She had to remember that she was infuriated with him. "Done trying to scare away her lovers, man-child?"

"Lovers?" Jayne scoffed. "An', I ain't no ruttin' child."

"Ain't no ruttin' girl." River counter mocked as she writhed against him. "Ready to be a woman, but you scared away opportunity. Humiliated her!" She contemplated bringing her leg back and kicking him in the face, but decided that might be too extreme.

All the girl's thrashing around and grinding her backside into his front while trying to get free, was leaving him a little more excited than he cared to be. Suddenly alarmed by his state of arousal, he released her. She spun around and glared at him, and for a moment he thought she knew.

Starlight pierced the dark kitchen. It beamed down from the skylight above and made everything white on her glow.

River crossed her arms and pouted heatedly. "She will remain a virgin for eternity!" Her face was all pink with exertion and she looked kind of cute all angered up. Usually, she was either plain smiley or just down right unnerving.

"It's possible." Jayne affirmed casually. Then a smirk of realization took over. "Wait a minute, thought ya said there were no virgins about."

"Was irking Simon."

"So, ya never…_never_?" Jayne asked with honest curiosity. The idea seemed so foreign to him. Almost like he'd hadn't been born one himself.

River felt her face darken with embarrassment, he was patronizing her and this peeved her further. "She…I'm ready. More than ready. But you…It's not enough that you're repulsed by the crazy in the girl, but you have to convince her suitors as well!"

Jayne hesitated a moment before responding. "That weren't the way of it." Ah, hell, couldn't hurt crazy to know the truth of things if she were looking to get all sexed up now. "Heard that runt talkin' wit' his friends at the bar. They was all bettin' he couldn't score a romp wit ya. Believe the bid was up ta 8 platinum when I left."

He studied her for a reaction. Maybe he was expecting her to wig out on him, but she just stared at him with those big ole eyes of hers and said nothing, so he continued. "To be honest, never really liked ya none. Ya drive me up the wall wit yer hair-brained ways. Yer strange, an' yer loony chatter never makes no gorram sense. But, I ain't gonna let the woman folk on this boat git taken fer. So, that's why I sent the guy runnin'." Jayne let out a long-winded breath. The way she was staring him down was making him sweat like a rutting pig.

"Didn't know. Thank you." River muttered faintly.

"S'right. But just remember, I ain't bailing ya out the next time. Do ya good ta learn an' read men-folk better." Jayne turned to go, but stopped abruptly as he thought of something else and spun back around. "Oh, an' wipe that _go se _off yer face. Makes ya look freakier than normal, an' that's a stretch."

"It's Day of the dead."

"Thought ya was done with the games, crazy?"

"Dia de los Muertos. A day to remember the dead. The spirits are with us."

Jayne looked around nervously. "Ghosts?"

"Your Nana Virginia wants to know when your going to stop footin' around and give her some grandbabies already." River recited absolutely.

Jayne's mouth popped open in shock. His Nana V. had been dead and buried for over twenty years now. "How'd…"

"She tells me lots of things concerning you. I'd be worried." Before Jayne could respond, River stepped forward and grabbed one large paw and pulled him in the direction of the cargo bay. "Come, Jayne-Beast. We're missing haunted tales from the 'verse."

---

They all sat in a circle of chairs as if around some imaginary bonfire. The amber glow from the many flickering candles caused black-flamed shadows to dance wildly up the cargo bay walls.

Shepard Book was in the middle of some sad tale about a nice man that was nailed alive to a cross. As intriguing as it was, River found her attention skirting between Book's gruesome depictions and the minute details of Jayne's face. Like that 'u' shaped scar on his cheek or the way his brow furrowed heavily when he was concentrating really hard.

Occasionally, the weight of his gaze would prompt her to look over at him. Just a peek, she lied, and wondered when her curiosity had spun out of control. When she caught his baby-blue eyes with her own coco-amber and smiled, he quickly looked away, feigning indifference.

Mal was now retelling some spiced up war tale, making it especially bloody as if that were a stretch. Jayne had heard theses stories a dozen times already in the very least. Frankly, he was more interested in the creature across from him, sitting ever so gracefully in one of the deck chairs, her long, smooth legs folded over to the one side.

_Gorram _if the girl weren't all kinds of confusing. One minute she was trying to offer his soul up to the devil, and the next, she was holding his hand dragging him through the ship. Now, she was staring at him with googly eyes, all sultry like from under her lashes. He wondered if this were another one of her little games. Womanfolk weren't to be trusted, no matter how shiny they looked in candlelight.

He tried to ignore her, but that damn dress kept slipping off her shoulder and her skin kinda glowed now that she'd washed all that pale crap off her face. The girl looked like some sorta dark angel sitting there.

He entertained the notion of getting up and leaving, but that would make it the second time he'd run from the girl in one night and that would be far worse than the discomfort he was feeling at the moment.

---

After the spook fest was over, and the candles all blown dark, Wash suggested watching a horror flick on the cortex to round out the holiday. Everyone except for Book was game, so he graciously excused himself and retired to bed.

There were a few yawns from the weary group as Kaylee and Wash flipped through the channels in the common room. Mal, Inara, Wash and Zoë coupled up on the long couch while Kaylee sat on Simon's lap in the oversized chair to the left. River and Jayne each took one of the chairs situated off to the far right.

They all sat silently and watched some movie about aliens taking over a ship in outer space, complete and utter science-fiction. One-by-one the crew nodded off.

River kept peeking over at Jayne throughout the entiretly of the film. His attention was fixed dutifully ahead, almost tensely frozen in place. She frowned in confusion. He couldn't keep his eyes off her before, and now it was like she wasn't even there. Not like the movie was that gripping anyway, everyone else fell asleep.

"Jayne? You in a wakeful state?"

"Yep."

"Jayne?"

"Um?"

"Nothing."

"Jayne?'

"What!?"

"Can I sit with you?"

"No!"

"I'm scared."

He just scoffed at her. "Nice try."

Then it was quiet. Too quiet. Jayne glanced over and found the girl's chair empty, and then from the opposite direction, she stealthy slithered atop of him. She sat sideways across his lap and casually leaned her head back against his broad chest as if she had been invited.

"Gorramit! Whatdaya think yer doin'?"

"Reading man signals."

"Huh? I ain't been signaling, little girl. Git off!"

"You have." River proceeded to count off her substantiations. "Earlier, you were aroused. Admitted to defending my honor. Offered relationship advice. Stared at me all night. Now you're pretending you're not interested only because you are."

Gorram girl was calling him out. If he had been uncomfortable before, it was nothing compared to the way his mind and body were screaming at him now. "Look. If'n I want someone, I have 'em. Don't play no games, 'specially not with lil' killer girls." He was scowling at her, trying not to think about her soft little bottom sitting atop his man parts.

River smiled wickedly, sliding her arms up and around his neck. She brought her lips to his earlobe, nibbling lightly on the soft flesh, sucking and grazing the sensitive skin with her teeth. Jayne let out a low, rumbling moan and instinctively placed his hands on her hips. All thoughts had vacated when her hot, wet little tongue started working its magic.

Pulling away, she wiggled her bottom into his lap and smiled with satisfaction as she felt the same large bulge that had been pressed up against her earlier when they were fighting. "Can't dispute the evidence. You want me to have Nana Virginia's grandbabies."

Jayne found it difficult to formulate words as River dipped her head back down and started trailing seductive kisses up his neck. "Don't want no kids…. An' even if'n I did, they ain't gonna… haffa moon brain fer a mother." He was sounding less convincing with each touch of her mouth to his skin, unable to ignore the trail of tingles the girl was leaving behind.

"Sanity…is…relative," she proclaimed between kisses.

"I ain't the one ya wanna be experimenting with." He continued to protest.

"An ideal subject." River nodded in approval and moved to straddle his lap, pulling her long dress up as she notched her body snugly against his. He could feel her heat through her thin panties as she pressed down, and it was causing him to throb something fierce. She placed her hands against his chest and breathed him in. "You smell feral."

"I showered!" Jayne defended.

River giggled as she snuggled against him. "Undomesticated. Needs to be house broken."

Suddenly, she pushed off his chest and sat back, cocking her head and nodding a little as if listening to some voice within. She then focused her attention back on Jayne and smiled. "Nana approves. Said I'm a much better choice then your painted ladies."

"That so?"

"Um hmm." River purred, and licked her lips slowly, leaning in, ready to lap up her treat.

Jayne gulped as he narrowed his focus in on those shiny, plump beauties ready for the taking. His resistance was wearing thin. The combination of her snacking on his neck and ears, and the seductiveness in her voice, all the while rocking her little body against his John Thomas, was turning the kindling into a roaring fire.

He puzzled at how he went from fearing and loathing the girl, to now wanting to rip off that pretty little white dress and make a woman out of her.

His large hands moved up her slender back, and up into her long, dark hair. Grabbing fistfuls, he pulled her head back gently and looked at her hard, his fierce blue eyes ablaze with animal-lust. He had been taunted and teased all night and he was going to make good and sure this was the real thing before he lost control completely. "I'm dangerous." He growled.

"Ditto."

"Can be downright wicked."

"Apropos. It's All Hallows eve."

"I'll hurt ya."

"You won't."

"Yer so certain?"

"You will fall in love with me. There will be little Cobbs."

"Haven't even sexed ya up yet."

"That's because you talk too much."

"I talk too mu…" River silenced his pre rant with her lips. Jayne tensed against her upon contact, but soon relaxed as a spark of endorphin's ignited impulse, shearing his last thread of resistance. He returned her kiss forcefully as he pulled her tightly against him, wrapping his bulky arms around her tiny frame.

For someone with so little experience, she had played it pretty self-possessed, but now she trembled against his lips, overwhelmed by intense feelings of lust and desire emanating from them both. His ache was hers and it had exploded into a supernova.

Hands roamed eagerly, caressing and exploring new territory as their lips moved together in synchrony. The kiss deepened as soft tongues broke the boundary of swollen lips. Muffled moans became more frantic as the urgency to explore further possessed them like hellfire.

He stood, never once breaking their connection. Cradling her bottom, he easily hoisted her up as she hooked her limber legs around him. Moving past the slumbering bodies of his crewmates, he headed them urgently towards his bunk.

Tonight was he was going to ravish her, body and soul, and spend all night long exploring her sweet, supple curves. They were going to sleep the morning away snuggled up on his way-too-small bed. The others would come looking, and probably find her there in his bunk, spent and sated. Screaming matches and threats upon his life would ensue and he would care not. He was going to keep her, marked and tagged with his scent. Most likely, it was she that now owned him, done what none before could, mastered the beast.

Yep, hers was the candy-corn kiss of death and she was his dark angel. He always knew the girl would be the end of him either one way or another. Except now, he was absolutely certain there was no better way to go.


End file.
